Amorous Relations
by Regina Noctis
Summary: Harry Potter leaves the Dursleys after HBP, leading to much training with a grizzled Auror, flirting with a pretty new Defense professor who just happens to be Snape's daughter, and one totally AU seventh year that leaves even JKR groping for a handhold.
1. Chapter I

Disclaimer: Please turn off all cell phones and other electronic devices before reading this story. Otherwise. . . cell phone rings REDUCTO! smirks You have been warned. Oh, and of course, JK Rowling is the real mastermind behind the Harry Potter Universe.

* * *

In the small suburb of Little Whinging outside of London, on a very plain street named Privet Drive, an owl hooted mournfully in the distance as the front door of Number Four opened and closed without a sound and seemingly without any assistance.

If any neighbor had been watching, they would have attributed it to the wind. But then, Harry Potter thought as he shifted his rucksack and checked to make sure that his Invisibility Cloak completely covered his feet, none of them had a clue (Arabella Figg notwithstanding) that the scrawny "delinquent" who shared their street over the summer was actually a wizard.

And if he played his cards right, he would walk out of their lives tonight—and would never come back.

After Dumbledore's death, Harry had come home to stay with his aunt's family—his last blood relatives on this side of life, as far as he knew—until he turned seventeen and came of age. But life with the Dursleys was worse than ever. Like the carrion predator who feeds on sick and dying animals, Vernon Dursley seemed to sense Harry's emotional turmoil and berated him all the more for his "freak" nature and friends. It had taken all of Harry's control, already worn thin by the death of the Headmaster, to keep from delivering Uncle Vernon to a worse fate than Aunt Marge.

Of course, Harry knew that it was inevitable—the waters always burst forth from the dam sooner or later. Two weeks into his stay, Uncle Vernon had, in a fit of temper, thrown a plate at Harry's head that Harry had not ducked in time, still groggy at seven in the morning. When Harry regained consciousness, he found himself locked into the dank cupboard under the stairs; he called out for hours, it seemed, but it wasn't until Aunt Petunia and Dudley came home much later that evening when he discovered what had happened.

It turned out that Vernon had had to be rushed to the hospital, as he had suddenly found himself unable to breathe while gloating over his prone nephew. A small heart attack, not life-threatening, was what the doctors diagnosed—but Harry knew better.

For one thing, he knew that if he stayed one moment longer with the Dursleys, someone, whether it was one of _them_ or himself, would most likely die. And Harry was not yet ready to be a murderer—he was saving that for Voldemort. Nor did he want to die yet, as he was also saving that for Voldemort.

Harry pressed his hand to the jagged scab above his right eyebrow, winced at the sudden jump in the throbbing there, and kept walking. The Dursleys really were stupid, he reflected. They had locked him into the cupboard, expecting him to be as helpless as he had been when he was ten—he had gotten himself out of the cupboard and the house in under an hour. His Firebolt was packed with a simple Reduction charm, Hedwig had been sent to stay with the Weasleys, and now Harry himself was walking away from the life he had been forced to return to for the last seven years. . .

"Awful late to be walking around, isn't it, Potter?"

Harry froze as the gruff voice broke the midnight silence. His right hand silently reached for the wand in the pocket of his jeans, but he was interrupted by the same voice growling, "Come now, you know you can't hide from me with an Invisibility Cloak," as Mad-Eye Moody limped out from the nearest hedge and shook off the leaves that stuck to his cloak.

"Pro—Professor Moody, I—what are you doing here?" Harry stuttered, pulling off the Invisibility Cloak and stowing it in his pocket, as it was useless to wear it around Moody's magical eye.

"How many times do I have to tell you, _I'm not your professor._" Moody took a few steps closer on his peg-leg and squinted with his good eye. "Nasty cut you've got there, boy. And you haven't answered my first question. You're not supposed to leave the Dursleys for another month."

Harry touched the scab with a sardonic smile. "Same answer to both—Uncle Vernon threw a plate at my head. I'm leaving because one, I can't take it any more, and two, I really should be out fighting Voldemort, not sitting around locked up in a cupboard. So, if you'll excuse me, I'd best be on my way." Harry turned to leave—and nearly stumbled had Moody not grabbed him by the arm and pulled him upright. He was more tired than he thought he was.

"Steady there, Potter, you won't be up to fighting Voldemort in that condition," Moody retorted, tugging at the young man's elbow. "You're coming with me."

"Where to?" Harry tried to stay awake, but the throbbing in his head was pulling a dense fog over his thoughts.

"Headquarters," was all Moody would say before pulling Harry into a particularly nasty Side-Along Apparition that knocked the younger wizard out for the count.

* * *

Harry woke up with a start. He was lying in a double-poster bed of the likes he had seen only in Hogwarts, in the middle of a room that looked as if it had waltzed straight out of the 19th century. As he sat up, realizing that he was still fully dressed, Moody banged open the door without so much as a perfunctory knock.

"Good to see you're up, Potter," the old Auror huffed. "That was quite a concussion Dursley gave you there—remind me to turn him into a hog the next time I see him."

Harry swung his feet over the edge of the high bed and yawned. "Where am I? And why'd you bring me here?"

"Why, you're in the Blacks' place, of course." Moody gestured around him; sure enough, Harry recognized his surroundings as one of the guestrooms on the second floor of Number Twelve Grimmauld Place. "As to the reason—well, let's say old Dumbledore wanted me to watch out for you. Seems like you've had a right dearth of good Defense teachers—I think it's high time to make up for that now."

"You—you're going to teach me? How to fight?" Harry squeaked, much to his embarrassment.

"Nay, lad, I'll be training you, not teaching you. Mighty big difference, there." Moody gave Harry a roguish wink before turning to go. "Come downstairs, breakfast is ready," he grunted over his shoulder. "You might want to enjoy yourself, as that's the last decent meal you'll have for the foreseeable future. Fighting Death Eaters isn't a cakewalk, you know, and neither is learning how."

* * *

Moody did not lie, that was for certain. Harry had never been pushed to work so hard in his life.

Every morning, Moody woke him at six, just as the sun was peeking over the London horizon. After a light breakfast and mug of coffee, they warmed up and began training. Harry felt as if every defensive and offensive spell known to wizard-kind was being crammed into his unwilling brain. Then, lunch, and more drills against Moody, sometimes a mock duel or two; it took Harry nearly a month to be able to pull Moody to a draw. Finally, a light dinner, and studying books on defense from the Black's enormous library before Harry crawled to his room and collapsed, most nights not even having the energy to undress. The only difference was on Sunday nights, when Moody would grant him the evening off to rest up for the next day; Harry used the time to send letters to Ron and Hermione, Hedwig having been sent back to him with a concerned letter from the Weasleys shortly after he had seemingly disappeared from the face of the wizarding world.

By the time the end of July rolled around, Harry cherished a small hope that he would be able to defeat Voldemort on his own merits—if Moody didn't kill him during training first.

* * *

On July thirty-first, Harry's seventeenth birthday, Moody woke him at the crack of dawn without a single hint of what day it was. Harry stumbled down the stairs, eagerly sniffing out the pot of coffee on the stove, only to be greeted by a huge red-and-yellow banner that stretched across the kitchen: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HARRY!

"Your father was an Auror, you know that?" Moody leaned awkwardly against the back wall, his peg-leg jutting out at a strange angle. "One of the best recruits I'd ever seen. He was my apprentice, I chose him myself—he went through the very same training I've been giving you. And he didn't make half the progress you're making—always trying to cavort off with your godfather or your mother instead of studying." Moody limped across the kitchen to where Harry was still gaping at his surroundings and handed Harry a brown-paper parcel. Harry slowly opened it, letting the wrapping drop to the floor when he saw what was inside.

It was a golden pocket-watch, merrily ticking away, a fleur-de-lis and lion intertwined on the cover. When Harry flipped it over, he read a short inscription: _To JP from LE, with all my love._

"Your father loved that watch," Moody said, slightly smiling at the memory. "A wedding present from your mother. Carried it with him until the day he died." As Harry turned the watch over and over in his fingers, still stunned, Moody pulled the boy into a brief (and uncharacteristic) hug. "James would be mighty proud of you, Potter, just remember that," Moody mumbled before releasing Harry.

Harry sniffled a little and wiped at his eyes as he continued to study the watch. "Er—sir? Can I ask a question?" At Moody's affirmative nod, Harry continued tentatively, "Since it's my birthday, can we take a day off, and—and can you tell me more about my parents?"

There was a long silence. Then, Moody broke into the first full smile that Harry had ever seen on him. It was a bit lopsided, what with all the scars on his face, but it was a smile nevertheless.

As he and Moody sat down around the kitchen table and Moody launched into the story of how James had first brought a beautiful red-head into Moody's office, Harry realized that this was the very best birthday he had ever had.

* * *

One afternoon in late August, as Harry and Moody were silently eating lunch in the kitchen, two official-looking owls swooped in through the open window and dropped their letters on the table in front of their plates before flying out with loud hoots. Moody immediately grabbed his and ripped it open; Harry leisurely finished his mouthful and, after glancing at the seal on the envelope, merely pushed it to the side and continued eating.

Moody caught the gesture, looked at the envelope for himself, and gave Harry a strange look. "Aren't you opening that, Potter? It's from Hogwarts."

Harry shrugged. "I don't need it—I'm not going," he replied after swallowing another mouthful.

Moody's knife clattered to the table. "I don't think I heard you correctly, boy," Moody growled, returning to his hardened-Auror routine. "You seemed to say that you weren't going back to finish your studies—but that can't have been what you said, right?"

Harry just stared at Moody over his plate in silence.

Moody snorted. "Give me three good reasons why you shouldn't go to Hogwarts, and I'll consider not tanning your hide from now until September first."

_You already tan my hide during training every day,_ Harry wanted to point out, but sighed instead and began to tick off the requested reasons on his fingers. "One: Dumbledore's dead, and there's nothing but a few stone walls and three hundred other students between me and Voldemort. Two: there's never any good Defense teachers anyway, so it's not as if I'm missing anything important. And three: I have to find and destroy some things that Dumbledore left me in charge of before I can even think about destroying Voldemort."

"What special _things_ are you talking about?" Moody asked, one shaggy eyebrow raised.

"Only Dumbledore and I knew what they were, and I won't break my promises," Harry replied mulishly.

Moody chuckled, much to Harry's surprise, then leaned across the table and whispered, "If you're talking about Horcruxes, Potter, it's no secret to me." Harry started and backed away from Moody's wildly-spinning eye in his face. "Dumbledore left me his Pensieve when he passed on, with all the memories he showed you before."

"Oh," was all that Harry could say. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Moody continued.

"And I can come up with more reasons than you can for why you should go to Hogwarts this year," he was saying, mimicking Harry by ticking off his fingers as well. "One: Hogwarts is more than just stone walls. Dumbledore may have been a powerful wizard, but nothing can top Olde Magick—the oldest and purest magic from a time when wizards hadn't invented wands yet. Hogwarts _breathes_ Olde Magick—in fact, it's one of the two Fonts of Olde Magick on the British Isles. That's the reason why you've been so well protected at Hogwarts these last six years. The real Voldemort, the one in his evil body, never was able to get you while you were at school, was he?

"Two: I have word from McGonagall here—she's the new Headmistress—that your Defense professor this year is the cream of the crop. An American witch, top honors from the Salem Witches' Institute, who turned down a spot at the West Point Wizarding Academy to come teach at Hogwarts—sounds promising enough to me.

"Three: Horcruxes can be hunted while you're still at school, boy, whether it's you or me that does it. For one, I'd much rather you had a solid, safe place to return to every evening rather than be camping out in the Merlin-forsaken wilderness. For another, once this bloody war's over, you'd be better off having taken your N.E.W.T.s and being prepared for the real world, as McGonagall's told me you wanted to be an Auror.

"Finally: Snape's going to be teaching Potions this year."

"WHAT?!" Harry spluttered, shooting up from his chair. "Isn't that a good enough reason for me _NOT_ to go?"

"Sit DOWN, Potter," Moody growled dangerously, "and let me finish!" Harry sank into his seat, staring at Moody as if he had turned into a ghost mid-sentence. "It'll be a good chance to keep an eye on the snarky dungeon bat, to make sure he doesn't make any Death Eater mischief. Merlin knows why the Board of Governors agreed to let a murderer teach again, but that's probably Voldemort's doing. You're well trained, better than he is—it'll be an easy match, should it ever come to that. To top it off, Tonks will be teaching Transfiguration for the year, so she'll be there to keep an eye on _you_ and back you up if the need arises."

Harry continued to stare. Moody pushed the unopened Hogwarts letter across the table and gently chucked Harry in the arm. "Better see what your school supplies are—we're going to Diagon Alley in the morning," Moody added in a tone that left no room for disagreement.

Harry muffled a sigh and broke the seal reluctantly. He knew when was the proper time to surrender—yet another useful element of his training.

* * *

The rest of the summer flew by in a flash, it seemed; and all too soon, Harry was standing on the bustling Platform 9 and 3/4. Unlike previous years, however, he had an escort: Mad-Eye Moody, whose grim appearance and frightening eye sent the younger students scurrying for cover and the older ones staring at his retreating form.

"Now, I want you to write to me the very _instant_ that Snape puts one toenail over the line," Moody was growling. Harry grimaced at the mental image, but Moody ignored him. "And remember, constant, constant, CONSTANT vigilance! I don't know about that Defense woman, but she could have ties to Voldemort, like half of those professors from the past six years have. Keep a watchful eye on her and Snape, and write often. I'll be out from Headquarters for the most part, but Hedwig will know where to find me."

As he and Harry reached the end of the platform, Moody paused and drew a sealed packet of parchment out of his cloak, which he handed to Harry. "Just a bit of news I thought you might enjoy—have a good year," he muttered, then clapped Harry on the back one last time and stumped off, leaving Harry standing alone in front of the puffing train.

Harry had time to glance at the outside of the parchment—it looked official—before hearing his name being called from inside the train. Looking up, he saw Ron and Hermione waving to him from one of the compartment windows; he stuffed the packet into his pocket and leaped aboard the train to find them, setting the curiosity of the packet aside for a better time.

What with his two best friends pelting him with questions about the summer—"We were so _worried,_ you left home before Dumbledore said you should, and then no news for _ages!_" "Yeah, mate, and did you find out anything else about the You-Know-Whats of You-Know-Who?"—Harry forgot about the packet until he was sitting at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall, mind glazing over as the Sorting Hat sang a different song of unity and house pride before starting in on "Atwood, Amanda." With a glance to make sure that no one was watching (Hermione was too busy studying the new students, Ron was too busy falling asleep), Harry slipped the packet from his pocket and broke the seal, eagerly scanning its contents.

He was disappointed to find that it was a contract of some sort, written in the most dry and pedantic language. He would have folded it up again had not one sentence jumped out at him (not surprisingly, as it had his name in it): "And thus do I, Alastor Moody, wish to name Harry James Potter as my one and only heir."

Harry blinked, re-read the sentence, and blinked again. Quickly, he flipped through to the very end. Signed at the bottom were Moody's scrawl, the dignified signatures of three Ministry officials, and one blank. That blank had his name printed underneath.

Harry closed his eyes, his mind racing. Moody, the man who had taken him in over the summer and taught him how to truly fight for the first time, wanted to adopt him, Harry Potter. It was something Harry had always dreamed of from the time he was living with the Dursleys. . . but he had always imagined it would be someone like Sirius, or even Dumbledore, signing that first line. Moody was the last person he would ever have dreamed of adopting himself—although, Harry thought as he put the packet safely back in his pocket, after the course of events from the past three months, maybe he shouldn't have been so surprised.

And then, Gryffindor was cheering raucously for their newest addition, Bryce Zimmerman, and Headmistress McGonagall was standing up at the staff table to make her beginning-of-the-year speech. Snape was sitting on her left, looking as snide and greasy as usual (and making Harry's blood boil), while a black-haired and somber Tonks was sitting to McGonagall's right. There was an empty seat at the far left, next to Hagrid; Harry assumed it was reserved for the Defense professor, who obviously had not arrived yet.

"Welcome, everyone, to a new year at Hogwarts," McGonagall began, looking around at the sea of students before her through her wire-rimmed spectacles. "Before the feast begins, I have just a few introductions to make, and then I shall let you enjoy the wonderful meal that the kitchens have prepared for us." At her words, the entire male portion of the returning student population applauded.

When the cheers died down, McGonagall continued, "First, as Professor Slughorn has returned to his quiet retirement, we would like to welcome back Professor Severus Snape, who will be teaching Potions again this year." Every table (with the exception of Slytherin) booed loudly, but they were all quickly silenced with a glare from McGonagall. Snape did nothing more than sneer at the students, as he always did.

"There _will_ be respect for _every_ professor here." McGonagall glared one last time before continuing again. "Second, as I will not be able to continue teaching or being Head of Gryffindor House due to Headmistress duties, Professor Nymphadora Tonks will be taking over Transfiguration for the year, while Professor Rubeus Hagrid will be Head of Gryffindor House."

Hagrid stood and bowed deeply, and Tonks nodded unsmilingly while most of the students applauded, Harry being the loudest of all. _Strange,_ Harry thought as McGonagall prepared to speak again. _Tonks hasn't looked this depressed since Sirius died. . ._

"And finally, let me introduce our new Defense professor, who has not yet arrived. This year, out of the twelve contenders for the position, this young witch from New England surpassed everyone by far. She graduated from the Salem Witches' Institute last year with the highest honors ever awarded to a student there; and she chose to teach at Hogwarts rather than continue her studies at the elite West Point Wizarding Academy. I do hope everyone will treat her with the due respect she deserves—"

At that moment, the doors of the Great Hall swung open, and the entire student population swung around to see a young woman in a light blue traveling cloak striding briskly to the front between the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables. A small black cat trotted at her feet, its fine whiskers twitching as it went. From her dark hair, Harry assumed she didn't have Veela powers; and yet, every young man there was stunned by the presence of this witch as if she was one—Ron was gaping slack-jawed, Malfoy was particularly affected, and Harry himself couldn't keep himself from staring.

And from the high table, the normally-detached Snape knocked over his goblet of pumpkin juice with a loud _clang_.

"My apologies, Headmistress." The woman's lilting American accent rang through the now-silent hall. "I was held up at customs—"

"Of course, of course, not a problem at all—welcome to Hogwarts." McGonagall smiled at the newcomer before turning to the student body.

"May I introduce your new Defense professor this year. . . Professor Susannah Snape."


	2. Chapter II

Disclaimer: While I am the captain of my soul (and creator of plot and original characters), JK Rowling is the creator of Potterverse and everything in it. No way am I going to try and take it from her, no sirree.

* * *

The school gasped, not only upon hearing the name of their new Defense professor, but also at the dramatic paling of their Potions professor. Harry had always thought Snape was as sallow as they came, but it turned out his bottom limit was at least two shades whiter.

But the girl—for a girl she truly was, Harry realized with shock, _she couldn't be much older than any of us in seventh year_—merely smiled at the shocked faces and continued to walk to her seat. As she passed her father (for her father Snape must be) Harry had a moment to compare the features of the two Snapes.

They truly did look like each other. The Defense teacher had Snape's hooked nose, strong jawline, high forehead, and height; but everything in her was softened effeminately, making her look rather pretty indeed. While her hair was not as black as Snape's, it was dark enough to pass—she looked, Harry thought, much as if she had dipped her shoulder-length hair first into red ink, and then into black. Her eyes were also particularly stunning, a vivid green that was similar to his own. They looked as if Harry's eyeballs had been forced into Snape's sockets—

_Not a pleasant thought,_ Harry shuddered as she sat down in the empty seat, nodding politely to her neighbor Hagrid. The black cat dived underneath the table and disappeared from view behind the white tablecloth.

Professor McGonagall cleared her throat before finishing with, "Let the feast begin!" The plates magically filled themselves as they always did, and the school proceeded to tuck in, loudly chattering amongst themselves. Ron heaped his plate with double helpings, with Harry following his example, before turning to Harry and Hermione with wide eyes.

"Oh. Merlin. Save us." He glanced heavenward. "I thought having Potions with Snape would be bad. . . now, we have _two_ Snapes in the school! Could things possibly be any worse?"

"How about having Umbridge as Headmistress again instead of McGonagall?" Harry suggested. "Or would that make things better?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Honestly, you two, it's not fair to be judging the new Defense professor already—all we know is her last name, for crying out loud! Even if she is his daughter, she might be much better than Snape—"

"Or not," Ron interrupted. "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, right?"

"Unless it's the Whomping Willow," Hermione retorted. "As _you_ should well know."

Harry was about to open his mouth to stop his friends from bickering again when he heard a small voice from somewhere down the table.

_Mmm. . . meat smells good. . ._

Harry's gaze flickered down the Gryffindor table. But no one near him that he could see would have been capable of such a high-pitched voice—unless it was a house-elf? But no, they wouldn't be asking for food.

_Wonder if someone would give me some dinner. . . Mistress is too busy talking. . ._

"Harry, mate, are you all right?" Ron was looking at him strangely. "You're looking all dazed-ish. . ."

"Do you hear something? A high-pitched voice asking for food?" Harry muttered, still looking for the source of the sound.

"No. . . is it another snake, do you think?" Harry was about to reply when Hermione gasped.

"Crookshanks, don't scratch—wait, you're not Crookshanks!" She ducked under the table, and a loud yowl later—_Get off me!_—emerged with the Defense professor's cat in her arms. It looked far from happy and struggled to get out of Hermione's arms, eventually succeeding and leaping on to the table, much to the astonishment of that end of the Gryffindor table.

To Harry's surprise, the cat pushed at his plate (as it was the closest one) and asked in a completely understandable voice, _Do you mind if I have some of your brisket?_

"Um, why, sure, if you want it," Harry said slowly—and found himself staring into a pair of shocked green eyes. It was the same eyes of the new Defense professor—and of Harry himself.

_You—you understand me?_ the cat squeaked in surprise.

"Err. . . yes, I suppose so, why?" Harry replied, aware that every Gryffindor was staring at him now.

But the cat didn't answer the question, merely grabbing a large chunk of meat before bounding off with a garbled _Thanks_.

"Um, Harry. . . were you just—talking to the cat?" Neville stammered from three seats down. Ginny, just a seat beyond Neville, looked rather unnerved by Harry's display—or was it more because of Harry himself?

Harry shrugged, his mind whirring as the other Gryffindors eventually went back to their dinner and conversation. Hermione was the last one to stop staring, and she wasn't the only one who looked completely bemused.

Could he understand animals like he understood snakes? Was it a result of his Parseltongue abilities? Harry racked his brain as he continued eating, but from none of his summer readings could he remember anything about Parseltongue side effects. And besides, he'd never been able to talk to a single one of Mrs. Figg's cats, not in all the years he had stayed at her house.

And then his thoughts were distracted by a pecking at his shoulder. He turned to see it—and almost choked on the food in his mouth at the small paper crane fluttering by his ear. It kept on fluttering until Harry reached out to grab it, at which point it landed in his outstretched palm and unfolded itself neatly to reveal a message in neat handwriting, much neater than Hermione's.

_When you're finished eating, I'd like to speak with you privately, up at the staff table. SSS_

Harry looked up in time to see the Defense professor wink at him before continuing her conversation with the gamekeeper. Then, he looked at his two best friends, who were staring at him with worried expressions, and sighed. _Wonderful way to start the school year—I get to have a one-on-one with Snape's daughter,_ Harry thought ruefully as he passed the note to Ron and Hermione for them to read.

* * *

Harry finished the rest of his dinner without any more strangeness, unless one could classify Ginny's point-blank avoidance of him as strange in itself—but then, Harry thought as he made his way to the staff table through the emptying hall, perhaps she was still angry over their break-up.

And before long, much sooner than he would have liked, Harry was standing before the new Defense professor, listening to himself say, "You asked to see me, Professor?"

The girl looked up from her nearly-empty plate and smiled. The cat he had fed was curled next to her and meowing happily. "Ah, yes, Harry, isn't it? Do call me Susannah—I'm not old enough yet to be called 'professor,'" she laughed, her green eyes twinkling. "I see you've met my Medea."

_Hello, master,_ the cat purred. _Thank you very much for dinner—it was delicious._

"Erm, certainly. . . it was a pleasure," Harry answered, then turned to Susannah. "Can everyone speak to her?"

"Goodness, no! She's my familiar, bound to my blood so that I can understand her—but for some reason, you are able to as well. Medea was quite pleased to have met two people tonight who can talk to her; understandably, though, you were far more pleasant of a partner than her first discovery." Susannah's eyes flickered to her left, where the grim Potions Master was fuming over his plate. Harry understood—talking to Snape would be nothing short of his own nightmare.

"So. . . Headmistress McGonagall tells me that you started your own club, the Defense Association, I think she called it?" Susannah said. "She speaks very highly of you when it comes to Defense, by the by. Says you're quite the fighter—and the teacher."

"Oh—well, Hermione, Hermione Granger was the one who got it all set up; I'm just the instructor." _And mascot, and highest incentive to join, I suppose,_ Harry stopped himself from adding.

"Really? Well, I commend the two of you for your innovativeness, but still. . . I must ask that you disband the club for this year."

Harry felt as if a large weight had struck him in the stomach. Working with the DA had been one of the few pleasures he had been looking forward to in coming back to Hogwarts. "Why?" he finally managed to ask.

"Because, Harry, I'll be doing most of the teaching myself, and I'd prefer it if the students had more time to focus on in-class studies." Susannah reached for her goblet, swirling its contents around as she spoke. "I think it's time for a change of focus in Defense in these dark days—less on the theory, more on the practical nature. Of course, you need to know your theory, but I think one picks up enough of that as one goes along for it to be effective. And we all know that danger is around every corner, literally these days—" She paused, just as she was about to sip her drink. "Can I ask you something, Harry? Do you know what it means to 'gather your magic' to a certain place?"

Harry nodded, unsure of where she was leading him. He had read about that theory during his summer with Moody; it was based on the concept that magic was loosely scattered throughout the wizard's body, and thus magic could be concentrated at will to different areas, both inside and outside the wizard. He had tried it before, gathering his magic to just behind his eyes, and found his sight heightened in both the physical and magical aspects; he almost considered using it to render his glasses unnecessary, but it took up far too much energy to be useful.

"Right, do me a favor, then—gather your magic to your nose and smell this for me." Susannah pushed her goblet forward so that it was right in front of him.

Harry closed his eyes, mentally groped for all the magic he could feel in his body, and wadded it up before pushing it to the tip of his nose. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed by different scents: Hagrid's sweat (how long since he last washed?), Susannah's perfume (smelled like lilies), flowers in the goblet beneath him—

Harry opened his eyes and looked into the goblet, the magic quickly dissipating. "When did pumpkin juice start smelling like _flowers?_" he asked Susannah now.

She shrugged. "Since I came here, I suppose," she quipped, then picked up the goblet and rose to her feet. "Thank you, Harry, you've passed the test. I'm looking forward to having you in my class." Susannah winked at him before sweeping off to leave, Medea jumping off the table to follow her.

Harry stared at her retreating back for a moment before turning to go himself. Most of the students had left the Great Hall to go to bed; only the teachers and a few stragglers were scattered throughout the Hall. Harry quickly beat his retreat to Gryffindor Tower, where he guessed his way to the password in three tries (really, even _Neville_ could figure out that 'Dumbledore' was the key) and went straight to bed. Ron was already snoring as Harry undressed and climbed underneath the covers.

_She seems nice enough,_ Harry thought as he pulled the drapes closed with a flick of his hand. _And looks nice enough, too,_ added another part of his brain before it was summarily strangled by his conscience, which looked amazingly like Ginny Weasley.

* * *

Susannah Snape was walking from the kitchens to the quarters that McGonagall had assigned to her, twirling an empty goblet between her fingers. She had gotten the information she needed—now, the only question was, _who_?

_Mistress,_ Medea hissed from a few feet behind Susannah. _Someone is following us. I think it's—_

_Yes, well, ignore him for now, Medea,_ Susannah thought back, cutting off her familiar. _He shouldn't mean any harm—I hope._

She continued walking to her rooms in silence, fully aware that human footsteps were advancing on her progress. Then, as she paused before her door, she said casually to the looming shadow behind her, "Thank you for the escort, Father, but I was perfectly able to find my rooms by myself."

The shadow froze before speaking in a voice she had not heard in seven years. "I would have expected a warmer greeting from you, my only daughter," Severus Snape drawled. "Especially as this is our first meeting in—"

"Seven years, I know." Susannah whirled on her heel to face her father, her words icy cold. "You plopped me off with a family of strangers—a family, perhaps, but strangers nonetheless—then visited me once a year until I turned eleven, and then abandoned me and cut off all contact from me for seven long years after that. And I'm supposed to still have daughterly feelings for you? If that's what you're thinking, then you've got another think coming."

"Now, now, Susannah, let's not be hasty." Severus threw up his hands in mock surrender. "You know I have a job, one I cannot leave so easily—"

"One that gives you the summer off, Father, do you take me for a fool?" Susannah paused. "Oh, that's right, I'd forgotten about that—Voldemort never did give you a holiday, did he? Yes, I suppose Death Eaters don't get that kind of privilege."

Severus visibly stiffened. "Susannah, you of all people should understand that I am a double agent—"

"And is that why you killed Dumbledore last spring?"

"_Stop interrupting me!_" Severus shouted, his angry voice ringing through the corridor. He took a deep breath before continuing with more composure. "Yes, I murdered Dumbledore, even I cannot deny that. But there were reasons—reasons you would not understand now."

Susannah rolled her eyes. "For Morgana's sake, Father, _please_ stop treating me like a toddler! I assure you, I can understand most logical reasoning, as long as you take the trouble to tell me what that reasoning may be."

"There also were good reasons for me keeping you away from Britain," Severus continued, ignoring his daughter's interjection. "Which is why I must insist that you return to the States and continue your studies there—you are in far too much danger to remain here, even at Hogwarts. The Dark Lord will be after your life if he should discover our relationship—"

"Father." Susannah's voice sharply cut through her father's words. "Thank you for looking after my _'best interests,'_ I believe you'd call it, but it's unnecessary. I am completely capable of looking after myself—I'm well on my way to getting a Mastery in Defense, after all. And it's old news—in fact, I was going to look for you and ask you if you knew anything about the belladonna in my pumpkin juice this evening." She lifted the empty goblet in her hand as if toasting her father.

Severus blanched.

"Not just a trace of belladonna, either," Susannah continued, calmly examining the goblet as if attempted poisoning was a normal, everyday occurrence. "In fact, had I been a fool enough to drink it, there was enough belladonna to drop me dead where I sat in five seconds. Whoever put it in certainly wanted to make sure the job was done tonight, don't you think?"

"Susannah, I—" But she waved off his stammering.

"Don't worry, Father, I'm not accusing you of anything—you'd poison me with less belladonna, just enough so as not to be detected while still killing me slowly. I did want to warn you, though, with a message for your less-than-competent colleagues." She leaned forward, her voice growing hard. "I am fully aware of the threats on my life, thank you very much, and I will be more than happy to take _defensive_ action on whomever dares to cross me. And I promise you, my _defensive_ action will be more than painful enough to compensate the _offensive_ action that provoked it. _Capiche?_"

Susannah smirked slightly as her father opened and closed his mouth like a dying fish, then turned away and faced the door to her chambers. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'd best be getting to bed—early classes tomorrow morning, I'm sure you understand. Susannah Sabrina Snape." The door swung open, creaking on its hinges, and Susannah stepped into the darkened room on the other side. "Good night, Father," she said with a small nod, her tone completely devoid of emotion, before slamming the door shut on her father's face as he tried to approach her one last time.

Medea, who had been watching the entire conversation from the shadows of the corridor, now trotted over to the still-staring Severus. The cat hissed and bared two white incisors, causing Severus to take a step back in shock.

_You'd better not hurt my mistress, or else I'll disembowel you slowly and painfully,_ he distinctly heard the cat say, with surprising ferocity for one so small. _You're not a good person at all. Mistress and young master were right about you—you need some serious help._

"'_Young master?'_" Severus repeated, but Medea wasn't listening. The black cat was pacing back and forth in front of her mistress' door, purring all the while. A small cat-flap suddenly appeared at the bottom of the door, whereupon the cat leapt through with one final purr, leaving one very confused and aggravated Potions Master staring at the door to his daughter's chambers.


	3. Chapter III

Disclaimer: I have no claim over any of the characters in the Potterverse except for the ones I have created for this story. phone rings Hello? Speaking. Who's this? Rowling's attorney? Can't you see I've just made the disclaimer, for crying out loud?! Leave me the hell alone! slams receiver down Sorry 'bout that, folks…shouldn't happen again.

* * *

Harry awoke late the next morning with a throbbing ache in his scar and plagued by an unexplainable sense of irritation. Rubbing his forehead, he winced as his scar gave a particularly strong prickle of pain. Voldemort was upset about something, that was for sure. What he was upset about was not something that Harry wanted to wake up thinking about.

When he pulled back the bedcurtains, Ron looked up from tying his shoelaces while sitting on his own bed. "Morning, Harry," he said. "Say, what took so long last night? Hermione was getting rather worried."

Harry shrugged. "Professor Snape wanted to talk to me, so I did."

Ron blinked. "You mean, Snape Junior, right?" Harry nodded. "What's she like? Like father, like daughter, I'd bet."

Harry thought for a moment before shaking his head. "No, she's actually pretty nice." _And good-looking,_ Harry added mentally for good measure. "I mean, really, you wouldn't be able to tell that she's Snape's daughter if you didn't know her name."

Ron looked a little disbelieving at that, but he restrained himself from doing more than merely snorting air. Harry was relieved that Ron let the subject drop—he wouldn't know how to explain the fact that he thought Susannah was pretty to his best friend and former girlfriend's brother.

The pair washed up and headed down to the Great Hall together, where they found Hermione waiting for them, all three of their class schedules in her hand. "We have the new Professor Snape first," she said as they sat down on either side of her. "Defense after breakfast."

"And Merlin be damned, NEWT Potions in the afternoon," Harry sighed after Hermione passed their schedules around. "Remind me why I agreed to taking this class?"

"Because, Harry, Aurors need to have a good knowledge of Potions on the job," she said reasonably. "What would happen if you found someone who was poisoned, but you didn't know how to treat them?"

"I'd send them off to St. Mungo's." Harry ripped into his toast with a vengeance. "Besides, it was less painful under Slughorn. At least _that_ man knew how to teach."

Hermione sighed and resignedly spread the marmalade on her English muffin, while Ron tore into his omelette, oblivious to the world during meals as always.

* * *

Harry was surprised, upon walking into the Defense classroom, to find it completely remodeled. Hermione and Ron, neither of whom had heard Harry's conversation with Susannah the night before, froze in the doorway and looked in with jaws slightly dropped.

The desks had been removed, and one section of the floor in front of the chalkboard had been raised as a makeshift dueling platform. Instead of desks, Muggle folding chairs were laid out in a semicircle around the platform, creating an air of spectacle around what would most surely be the in-class demonstration.

Harry almost felt like laughing out loud. Finally, a teacher who could prepare them for a _real_ fight! And Moody had trained him during the summer for something just like this! But his smile was cut off by the entry of Malfoy and his goons, who forced their way through his friends and swaggered over to the front row of seats. Damn, he'd forgotten—it was double period with the Slytherins again.

"Hey, Potter!" Malfoy sneered at him. "How long do you think you'll last up there? I'm taking bets—I'd wager half-a-minute before you faint from terror." He mimed passing out with his hand on his forehead, to the slow guffaws of Crabbe and Goyle, as well as laughter from the other Slytherins trailing in. Neville, who had entered after everyone else, and Ron growled deep in their throats at the insult.

Harry rolled his eyes. "Malfoy, that got old four years ago—" he started to say, but was cut off by the arrival of Susannah. Her hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail, and she wasn't wearing the standard teacher's uniform of black robes—rather, her robes were dark green (_which sets off her eyes so much better,_ Harry thought) and trimmed with gold brocade. Behind her, Medea trotted into the room and settled into the corner with a happy meow. Harry waved at her slightly, and the cat whisked her tail at him in response.

Susannah's entrance effectively stopped all the chatter, and a silence descended upon the classroom. Harry wondered how she managed that—then remembered that she had Snape's blood in her, after all.

"Good morning, everyone," she said, stopping in front of the platform and facing the class with a smile on her face. "My name is Susannah Snape, and I will be your Defense Against the Dark Arts professor this year. As I would like not to be confused with the other Professor Snape at Hogwarts, I would appreciate it if you called me by my first name. Susannah with an 'h'—not Susan, not Sue, just Susannah. And don't call me Susie unless you have an immediate death wish. In return, I will be calling you by your first names, as we do in the States. Far too confusing otherwise, what with all the siblings and cousins and Lord knows what-all in my classes."

"Susannah," Parvati Patil called over the titters in the room, "is Professor Snape really your father?"

Susannah crossed her arms and nodded. "Frankly, I'm as surprised as the rest of you—but yes, Professor Snape must have had _some_ romance in his past. Frightening thought, no?"

Harry couldn't help but laugh aloud at that, and he could have sworn Susannah winked in his direction before Seamus shouted from the back, "What's up with the robes?"

"This is my uniform from the Salem Student Aurors Association," Susannah replied. "I was the leader of one of their most elite battalions, and we did our fair share of battles against Voldemort's—oh, for crying out loud, I'm not here to teach a bunch of wusses!—supporters in the States. We may not have many, but the few we do have are too many as it is."

"They sent out a group of students to fight V-voldemort?" Hermione stuttered. "But—that's dangerous! And risky!"

Susannah shook her head. "No, not _just_ a group of students. A group of students who excelled at Defense and were trained to be the best of the best. Consider it an internship to be an Auror, if you will. And that's what I'm here to do at Hogwarts—make you the best fighters there are, and then you'll be able to take on your own demons, easily."

"With all due respect, _Professor_," Malfoy drawled, "we don't need some Yank coming over and showing us how to play with our wands. We don't have anyone attacking us as it is—why should a bunch of kids need to know how to fight?"

Susannah leveled him a long look as the class broke out in whispers again. Malfoy, Harry noticed, soon flushed and dropped his eyes. "Well, Draco," Susannah finally said. "We're all entitled to our own opinions, but I'd appreciate it if you would keep your mouth shut over what you don't know. Or know _too_ well, perhaps. Oh, and I don't teach you to 'play with your wands'—something tells me you know how to do _that_ plenty well. Or do you just _look_ like a ponce by intention?"

Harry hid a grin behind his hand as Malfoy turned an amusing shade of puce, and the rest of the Gryffindors laughed or applauded appreciatively. Harry noticed not a few Slytherins smiling at Susannah's witty retort as well—perhaps Malfoy's popularity in his own House was declining. Then, to everyone's surprise, Susannah took Draco by the hand and forcefully dragged him up to the stage behind her. "Since Draco was kind enough to be the first to voice his thoughts on the matter," she announced, drawing her wand, "I'll borrow him for this first demonstration."

"Please, don't bother returning him—he's already damaged goods," Ron muttered, earning an elbow in the ribs from Hermione.

"Stand on the opposite end, Draco. There, that's good—mind the edge, we don't want you falling off before we start! Now, on the count of three, we'll cast at each other, even though we won't get that chance when we're in a real battle for our lives. Dark spells are not to be used in this room, and the duel is officially over either when one of us is incapacitated in some way, or one of us has our wand at the other's jugular. Ready? One—two—thr—"

"_Crucio!"_ Malfoy snarled before she'd finished, drawing gasps from the rest of the class. Harry whipped out his wand on instinct, ready to hex Malfoy within an inch of his life—

But Susannah had cast a Pentagon Block, a quick and effective shield that Moody had drilled Harry into learning near the beginning of their training, before the red curse was even halfway across the platform. The shield sizzled as the Cruciatus struck it and quickly evaporated; no sooner had it disappeared than she cast a Disarming Charm. Malfoy was so shocked that he was hit before he had time to cast a shield of his own. Harry joined the loud applause with the other Gryffindors; he suspected that Malfoy was counting on the element of surprise (both in terms of time and method) to win the duel, but it had utterly backfired.

"Mr. Malfoy," Susannah nearly spat out in an icy tone once Malfoy's wand had soared into her outstetched hand. "I do believe I said to wait to the count of three, as well as _no Dark spells in this room._ Not only do you not know how to count, but you obviously know spells you shouldn't at this age. Twenty points from Slytherin, and detention with your Head of House this weekend."

"That's not fair! You can't—"

"Yes, I can, Mr. Malfoy. And if you don't shut up, I'll make it forty points and detention for the rest of the week as well. Now, sit down, and take your pathetic excuse of a wand with you." Susannah threw the vanquished wand at Malfoy, and he fumbled to catch it while the class snickered at her choice of words.

Susannah waited until Malfoy had sulked off the stage before continuing with her lecture. "I don't mean to brag here, but it's true that I was commander of the SSAA—" she pronounced it 'double S, double A,'"—for a reason. Therefore, today's class will be a combined practical and challenge. I don't know how much you all know about dueling as of now, so I will call each of you up to fight against me for a few minutes. The student—or students—who are able to defeat me in battle will receive a prize of one hundred points for their House." Titters resumed at that announcement. "This will help me learn your names and your current levels, as well as allowing me to point out certain aspects of fighting that we will study in future classes. So. Are there any volunteers?"

There was a short pause before several Slytherins stepped forward, and then the fun began. At least, Harry thought it was fun—Susannah seemed to have fun as well, seeing as she was flattening every opponent that came her way. She whipped off jinxes, charms, and shields like a professional; and her coordination and flexibility was to be envied by all the students, both male and female. Not a single student was able to penetrate her solid defenses, and she had run through the entire class (except for him) within a matter of half an hour.

Harry was pleased and proud to note that the students who held out the longest were all members of the Defense Association. Neville did exceptionally well out of all of them, even managing to disarm Susannah with a well-placed Disarming Charm on a weak spot in her shield. But he made the mistake of lowering his wand once he had caught hers, as Susannah soon had _another_ wand pointed at his throat before he could say, "Herbology."

"All right, class, what does this teach you?" she asked after Neville had dejectedly jumped off of the stage.

"That you're a sneaky devil?" Dean suggested to much laughter. The Gryffindors were quickly warming up to their new teacher, and the Slytherins (Malfoy notwithstanding) were following close behind.

Susannah grinned as she retied her hair, which had started to come out of its ponytail during the duel with Neville. "Not exactly, Dean. Always have another wand on hand, that's the moral of the story. Or two wands, if you can afford it. If you need an inexpensive second wand, I'd suggest ordering it from the States—it's cheaper, but not much lower in terms of quality. Ollivander's is still the best wandmaker in the world, though, even I have to admit that much."

"Where do you keep the extra wand?" Hermione asked; and Susannah revealed a sleek wand holster tied to her right forearm, drawing _oohs_ from the other students.

The last student before Harry was Vincent Crabbe, a near-Squib if there ever was one. After nearly getting hit by Susannah's Stunner, he gave up on the idea of magic altogether and charged across the platform. But in a feat of gymanastics that caused several girls to scream, Susannah did a back-flip out of the way, kicking Crabbe in the jaw and sending him flying over the edge of the platform as he clutched at his mouth.

Susannah landed on her feet and walked over to the edge, peering down at the groaning large boy below her. "Hospital Wing for you, Vincent. Ah, yes, thank you, Gregory, please escort him there. Now, class, Vincent's methods are a good introduction to another question. What would _you_ do if your opponent was physically attacking you?"

"I'd hex him," called Blaise Zabini.

Susannah shook her head. "But what if he was a Muggle? You'd violate the Statute of Secrecy for a mere barfight? Besides, if he's got a gun—that's a Muggle wand for killing people—then you'd be dead with a hole in your chest before you could say, '_Stupefy._' Or, what if you didn't have your wand on you, or were disarmed in some way? That's why I'll be teaching you Muggle martial arts—yes, Mr. Malfoy, a _Muggle_ sport, and I'd suggest you close your mouth since having a gaping hole in your face doesn't become you in the least." Harry snickered as Malfoy snapped his mouth closed around whatever retort he was about to make, looking very much as if his comment was made of lemons. "This is why your schedules have Defense Against the Dark Arts listed as a daily class—two days of lectures, two of dueling practices, and one of martial arts sessions. Within a few months, I wouldn't be surprised if you'd be able to take on stronger men twice your size—yes, even the girls will be able to do this. Look at me: I'm small and light, even for a woman, and I could take advantage of Vincent even though he could throw me over his shoulder like the proverbial sack of meal."

Susannah paused for a moment, her green eyes scanning the room until they came to rest on Harry. "And I do believe we have one last student to test," she said, and Harry stood up with a knot of nervousness settling into the pit of his stomach. He wasn't looking forward to getting his arse served to him in front of the entire class. _Just relax,_ Harry told himself as he and Susannah took positions at opposite ends of the platform. _Moody taught you well, right? Just fight hard and do him proud…_

"Don't worry, Harry, I won't be cutting any slack for the Boy Who Lived," Susannah dead-panned before raising her wand. "One—two—three!"

"_Tarantellegra!_" Harry shouted.

"_Petrificus Totalus!_" Susannah cried at the same time, and the battle was on with a flash of light as the spells collided in midair.

Harry realized, with a rush of adrenaline as he cast and cast for a good six minutes without pause, that he really missed dueling with Moody. It was a way to get the frustration out, and it had more excitement than even playing Quidditch could provide. He constantly had to dodge if he wasn't fast enough to get a shield up, and he reverted to the standard dueling spells that he had practiced with Moody daily rather than trying for the impressive, flashy spells. Susannah was also putting forth her best effort, but there was no concealing her surprise that Harry hadn't fallen before the five-minute mark like the rest of his classmates.

"_Incarcerous!_" Ropes snaked out of Susannah's wand and flew at Harry.

"_Diffindo!_" The ropes fell to the ground, severed close to her wand's tip, and joined the other debris that cluttered the dueling floor. _Oh, damn, the debris,_ Harry realized a moment too late—

"_Muris Natum!_" Mice erupted out of the cut rope, eliciting shrieks from the girls in the room. _Remember, boy,_ Harry heard Moody growl in his head, _keep the fighting area clear, since junk on the floor is the perfect weapon waiting to be sprung…_

"_Serpentiosa!_" A large green snake (Nagini's cousin, seemingly) burst into existence and swallowed most of the mice in one gulp before turning on Susannah. More screams from the girls, and Susannah herself wasn't looking too pleased by his choice of a counter.

"_Evanesco! Confringo!_" The first spell hit the snake, making it disappear instantly, while the second struck Harry's hastily-erected shield. The force behind the spell made Harry stagger a step back, which opened up a weak spot for Susannah to strike. "_Expelliarmus!_"

Harry felt his wand fly out of his hand, but he wasn't nearly ready to go down yet. He threw himself backwards for his wand, casting a wordless Summoning Charm in the meanwhile, and landed hard on his bum with his wand back in his hand. He whirled around, ready to cast his next spell—

Only to feel flesh digging into the tip of his wand at the same time that he felt something hard prod him in the neck. Susannah and Harry stared at each other with both of their wands pressed into the other's throat. The class was so quiet that Harry could hear the wind rattle the window panes outside of the classroom.

"Well," Susannah said, her eyes not leaving Harry's. "I think we'd better call this a draw."

* * *

Harry rubbed at the sore spot on his throat where Susannah's wand had dug in just a tad harder than he would have liked. For his efforts, Susannah awarded Gryffindor fifty points, as well as an extra fifteen for such a strong showing from Neville. That, at least, made Harry happy before his afternoon nightmare with Snape Senior.

He was surprised, though, that Hermione and Ron seemed to be giving him the cold shoulder immediately after class. When he approached them in the Gryffindor Common Room and asked what the problem was, Ron sniffed at him, "Tell us the truth, Harry. Were you playing soft with Missus Snape, or not?"

"Wh—what? No!" Harry was indignant. "Why should I? I wanted the hundred points as much as the next Gryffindor! What the hell are you talking about?"

"Harry," Hermione said in a slightly patronizing tone. "We can see you like Susannah. But she's our professor, and you need to keep her distance with her."

"She's our age, Hermione," Harry answered through gritted teeth. "She's probably just as lonesome as we were when we first arrived. So what if I want to be nice to her? That won't affect my performance in class."

"Harry, mate, if you fought like that with You-Know-Who, you'd never have survived!" Ron exploded. "We just don't want you to get hurt!"

"Ron's right. And Harry," Hermione added, "besides the fact that it's not professional to fraternize with teachers…you don't want to hurt Ginny, either, you know."

Harry stared at the two of them for a long moment, his anger building as time passed. "Oh, that's _rich,_" he finally growled. "I'm the only one who's ever fought Voldemort face-to-face nearly every year since I turned eleven, and you're telling me how well I'd do against him? Try again, _mates._ Oh, and Hermione? I'd talk to Ginny about what _she's_ been doing these past few days—if there's one person who's hurting the other, it would be her. She's been avoiding me ever since we got here; and if that doesn't give a guy a hint, I don't know what does. So, please, don't try to tell me what to do—I can manage my own life, thanks." And with that, he turned on his heel and stomped out of the Common Room, slamming the portrait door as he went and earning himself a good yelling from the Fat Lady.

As a result, Harry found himself wandering the corridors with an hour left before Potions. He didn't feel like studying, and going back to the Common Room was strictly out of the question. After a few minutes of aimlessly strolling around, he found himself in front of McGonagall's old office on the first floor. Driven by curiosity more than anything else, he tentatively raised a hand and knocked on the oaken door.

A minute later, the door was opened by a disheveled, black-haired Tonks. Her eyes were red, and they widened upon seeing Harry—but they were without the normal life Harry had been used to seeing there. "Harry! Wh—what a surprise," she said faintly. "Did—did you need something?"

Harry shrugged, more than a bit perturbed by Tonks' behavior. "No, just was in the neighborhood and wanted to say 'hello,'" he said. "We have you next week, by the way. Everyone's talking about it—they can't wait to see you show up McGonagall."

"Why—that's awfully kind of them—really, I mean—I'm nothing compared to Minerva," Tonks stammered, and that was when Harry knew something was wrong. The Tonks he knew may have been clumsy, but she was never at her wit's end when it came to humor.

"Do you mind if I come in?" Harry interrupted her rambling before it made him even more uncomfortable. Tonks stopped talking and blinked at him rather owlishly.

"Well…sure, if you want," she murmured, and stepped aside to let him into her quarters.

Harry was frankly surprised by the spartan interior of Tonks' office. With the exception of several pieces of utilitarian furniture that he recognized from McGonagall's days, he didn't see anything that reminded him of Tonks' bright and playful personality. Something was wrong with her, and Harry fingered his wand in his pocket with some nervousness as Tonks came out from the back room—her bedroom, he supposed—with a pot of tea in her hands.

Harry decided to start out the conversation, as she was pouring the tea into their cups in dead silence. "So," he began valiantly. "I've been terribly out of the loop this summer, what with studying with Moody and all, but I'm sorry for not writing sooner. How's Remus? What did he think about the job?"

Harry expected some sort of response from her, seeing as Remus _was_ her affianced, but he didn't expect her to nearly drop the teapot as she burst into tears.

"Tonks!" Harry didn't know how to comfort her; she was crying into her balled-up fists, and her hair cycled from black to purple to blue and back to black again. "Tonks, what's wrong? Is it Remus? Is he OK? What happened??"

Tonks stopped crying long enough to glare at Harry with puffy eyes. "Oh, I'm sure the bastard is perfectly _fine,_ wherever he is," she snarled. Harry nearly jumped at the venom lacing her every word. "Seeing as _I'm_ not around to ruin things for him…"

"Tonks, Remus isn't like that, I'm sure of it. Has there been some—misunderstanding between the two of you?" Tonks just shook her head, the tears streaming down her face.

"We were going to be married—in October," she whispered bleakly. "He said—he said he wanted a little happiness around Halloween, to help him forget, you know? And then—I found out. I was—we'd—he'd gotten me _pregnant._ And he didn't want that. Yelled at me, for not trying hard enough to prevent it, and then—he left the house that night. I haven't seen him since. He sends back all my owls, and I can't find him listed anywhere." Her voice rose to a maddened cry. "Do you understand, Harry? _That selfish bastard abandoned our son!_ He left me because he didn't want to be a father! He didn't want his son to know what it was like to be loved by a dad! McGonagall took pity on me and gave me this job, since it's mostly desk work and Poppy doesn't ask too many questions…" She choked back her tears. "Merlin, I hate the prick for this, for all he's done to me. But—but I still miss him, and it hurts so much, when I look at the bed and see how damn _empty_ it is, and then I wonder—what I'm going to tell my kid when he's old enough…"

Tonks finally collapsed onto her knees and wept loudly, leaving Harry rooted to his chair as he stared at the sobbing Auror before him and tried to comprehend how the most responsible man he knew could do such a thing to the woman he'd professed his love to just a few months earlier.


	4. Chapter IV

Disclaimer: *walks in, shivering* Brr…while this wonderful weather outside may feel like we're living in Scotland, I'm sorry to inform you that I am not JK Rowling, that I own nothing of the Potterverse or otherwise, and that we're sitting plop in the middle of the United States of America. *trips and plunges headfirst into a snowbank* Erm…maybe just a touch of help here?

* * *

Harry spent the rest of his free time before NEWT Potions in comforting his stricken Transfiguration Professor. She couldn't stop crying, no matter how often he hugged her and told her that it wasn't her fault. He figured that his words were probably not totally convincing, as he _was_ nearly twenty years her junior; but he did what he could to lessen her tears before running off to his next class.

As a result, he was just fifteen seconds late when he sprinted into Snape's dungeon for Potions. Snape raised his head from his attendance sheet and glared at Harry as the latter slowed down to a walk and sat down in an empty chair—well away from Ron and Hermione, who were also giving him cold looks.

"Ten points from Gryffindor for your lateness, Mr. Potter," Snape snarled, surprising even Harry with the hatred in his voice. "And if you are late again, rest assured, I will see to your removal from my class."

And those words set the tone for the rest of the class. Snape was relentless, tearing apart every Gryffindor's potion for the day. Hermione was close to tears by the time Snape was through with her; Harry, on the other side of the room, felt slightly bad for her before Snape came around to rip into his own work. Harry still hadn't gone back to the Room of Requirement to retrieve the The Half-Blood Prince's old textbook, and he knew it would be folly to use the book right under Snape's hooked nose in the first place. Thus, his attempt at an Invigorating Potion turned into a mass of unusable goop by the end of class.

Snape, during one of his rounds through the classroom near the end of the period, peered into Harry's cauldron with thinly-veiled disgust. "Fifty points from Gryffindor for such shoddy work," Snape said under his breath. "And you may stay behind to clean up after everyone else, Potter, as your personal punishment."

Harry stared at Snape's retreating back and wondered (not for the first time, and most likely not for the last) how the daughter could differ so greatly from the father while still being related.

Ten minutes after the bell had rung, the classroom was deserted, except for the fuming Snape at the front of the room and Harry crouched over beneath a desk, scrubbing at a surprisingly vicious stain in the wooden floor. He considered asking if he could use magic to remove the stain, but fear of the Potion Master's possible response kept Harry quiet. And so it was that he remained unnoticed when Susannah strolled into the dungeons, making a beeline to Snape's desk and stopping before her surprised father. Medea came in behind her, eyes twitching to Harry only once before following her mistress and curling around Susannah's ankles.

"Father," Susannah said by way of greeting, her arms crossed over her chest. "I have a bone to pick with you."

Snape looked his daughter up and down once. "I see no bone on your person, but speak anyway," he drawled, leaning back in his chair and setting his quill down on the table.

Susannah sniffed, but continued anyway. "Headmistress McGonagall approached me today, after my morning classes, and asked me to join some sort of secret society that's working against Voldemort," she said, her voice kept soft and neutral. Harry felt his heart jump a little at that. Susannah, working for the Order? "I am aware that you are a member of this 'Order of the Phoenix' as well, are you not?" Susannah asked.

Snape nodded once, jerkily and with his lips pressed in a line. "Indeed," he acknowledged. "But what does this have to do with your bone?"

"My duties, Father, are to help a certain Mr. Potter train for any upcoming battles he might have, as well as to help him hunt for certain artifacts that will prove useful to our cause," Susannah continued as if Snape had never even spoken. Harry stopped even pretending to clean and turned his attention whole-heartedly to eavesdropping instead. Susannah was supposed to help him find the horcruxes, too? Harry hadn't even thought McGonagall knew about the horcruxes… "The bone was regarding your opinions on Mr. Potter as a student that you have made clear both to me and to others on the faculty. I was hoping you might have possibly changed your opinions since your last outburst?"

Snape bared his teeth in a fierce grimace. "Potter is an arrogant, incompetent berk like his father," he growled. "He only survived against the Dark Lord this long because of his friends and sheer dumb luck. It is a shame that the fate of the Wizarding world rests on his shoulders—it will be nothing short of a miracle if he even survives, much less wins."

Harry wanted to do no more than get his wand and hex Snape to the far side of next Tuesday; but the coldness in Susannah's tone stopped him from moving. "You're wrong, Father—completely blind and with not a whit of judgment, if these are your true feelings," she said harshly. "Harry Potter is perhaps the most talented wizard I have ever come across. He knows some of the most arcane and difficult magic in the world and performs it with ease—he produced his first Patronus when he was thirteen, and he can gather magic about him with such ease that Merlin must be rolling in his grave! And I was even awarded full scholarship to West Point for my dueling skills…Harry very nearly beat me after almost ten minutes of non-stop hand-to-hand dueling! Father, you are sorely mistaken in your opinions, and I do hope you rectify this sometime in the near future."

Snape merely steepled his fingers on the desk and sneered up at his daughter. "Perhaps you are going soft on the boy…perhaps you dare to have _feelings_ for him?" he asked tauntingly.

Susannah visibly stiffened. "Father, how _dare _you suggest I am anything less than professional—" She was ready to launch into a rant, spinning on her heels and starting to pace back and forth, when her eyes fell on Harry still frozen under the table. She stopped, her eyes softening immediately. "When the student in question is still in the room, no less," Susannah finished with a small smile. "Harry, if you'd do me a favor and come out from under there, I doubt sitting on the floor is to your liking…"

Harry slowly crawled out, deriving some sheepish pleasure from seeing Snape flush angrily as both wizards stood and faced each other, glaring. Well, it _had_ been Snape's fault to punish him by staying late to clean…

"Harry, perhaps if you'll come with me to my office, we can have a discussion on what course of action to take for the rest of the semester," Susannah said brightly, taking Harry's arm by the elbow and forcefully leading him out of the dungeon before either he or Snape could say anything more. Which, Harry thought as Susannah half-dragged him back to her office several floors up, was probably a good thing.

"Harry, I sincerely apologize on my father's behalf. I'm sure you understand more than I how…antisocial he can be at times," Susannah said once they were safely ensconced in her office. It was of a similar design to Tonks', except that Susannah had actually taken the trouble to decorate her office with signs and posters from her school days. One poster particularly caught Harry's attention. It consisted of a golden lion, artistically drawn and moving as if it were a magical photo, roaring against a dark blue background of twinkling stars, a recruiting poster from the context of the caption beneath the image.

_Hear Salem Roar for Freedom. The Salem Students Aurors Association. Your Future Awaits._

"Ah yes, the SSAA's recruiting poster from last year," Susannah said as she followed Harry's gaze, her voice tinged with some pride. "A good friend of mine—I stayed with her and her family while I studied in the States—designed the poster, and another good friend of mine enchanted it to move and roar on occasion."

Harry nodded, then turned back to the subject at hand. "What was it that the Headmistress wanted you to teach me, Susannah?"

Susannah paused, then burst out laughing. "Ah, I see you weren't entirely focused on scrubbing my father's floors, were you?" she said, amused. "Well, then. Yes. Headmistress McGonagall wanted me to train you to prepare for your upcoming battle with Voldemort. I told her that your dueling skills have left little to be desired, and so she suggested that I train you in other, more unusual areas. She mentioned something of how you and my father did not agree when it came to Occlumency?"

Harry slowly nodded, grinning just a little sheepishly. "Sorry, but getting told to 'clear my mind' before having it get torn to pieces just doesn't seem like good teaching to me," he admitted, not sure how Susannah would take this criticism of her father's teaching methods.

To his surprise, Susannah's eyes narrowed dangerously. "You're joking," she said darkly. "I don't know what the rules are around here for teaching Occlumency, but that would have gotten my father's teaching license revoked if he were back in the States. You're supposed to get a little more help than just 'clear your mind,' you know. That's mind rape, pure and simple."

Harry shrugged it off, a little embarrassed by Susannah's reaction. "Yes, well, I'm not so sure that Occlumency likes me any more than I like it," he tried to joke. But Susannah shook her head, her brows still knitted together with anger.

"No, Harry. It was the teacher at fault this time, not the student," she said with surprising vehemence. "Believe me, not even Merlin himself would've been able to learn Occlumency under those conditions. I _will _teach you Occlumency. There are plenty of different methods for clearing and shielding your mind that I can show you…"

When Harry left Susannah's office twenty minutes later, his mind was abuzz with all the different Occlumency techniques that Susannah had described to him—all of which would have made his life a LOT easier during the trying time of his "private tutoring" with Snape, Sr. He immediately turned down the corridor to head to the library, ready to do some research on the Zen meditation technique that Susannah had mentioned, continuing to marvel at Susannah's seemingly endless knowledge of defense magic and wondering why she hadn't already just up and defeated Voldemort for him.

* * *

It was early the next morning, just at the crack of dawn, when Harry went to the owlery to send off a thick package of parchment. In fact, it was the very same package that Moody had slipped into Harry's pocket two days earlier. However, there was one slight change to it. It had an extra signature. Harry's signature, to be precise.

_Well, at least it didn't come with the condition that I have to change my name to Moody,_ Harry thought as he sent Hedwig flying off through the window of the owlery.

And then, as he glanced down at the expanse of green and blue that made up the Great Lake, Harry thought he saw something black racing along the farther shore. Squinting his eyes, he couldn't quite make out what the dark shape was. A hippogriff? A thestral? No, there weren't any wings that he could see. A very large dog?

Wait. Very large dog…

His heart pounding in his chest, Harry turned from the window and sprinted out of the owlery, leaping over steps in great bounds in his haste to reach the ground floor and get outside. Perhaps it was too much to hope—after all, Harry had been the one to see Sirius Black fall through the Veil of Death in the Department of Mysteries. But just maybe, _maybe_ he'd gotten himself out?

Harry's sneakers pounded down the stone steps before he rushed out the front doors of the castle. He was panting by the time he'd reached the edge of lake; and he collapsed on his knees in the sand on the shore, breathing hard and holding the stitch in his side. _Come on, you're already out of shape, and it's only the second day in,_ Harry berated himself mentally. _Moody had you doing workouts every morning, maybe you should start doing that again—_

His thoughts were interrupted by a whickering noise. Slowly raising his head, Harry found himself face-to-nose with a black mare, who was so close to Harry that her breath quickly fogged up his glasses. He inadvertently sat down hard on the ground, quite shocked to find such a beautiful yet mundane creature roaming the grounds of the magical school…and also disappointed that his initial hunch was wrong. It definitely was NOT Sirius.

As Harry raised a hand to pat the inquisitive creature on the head, while the horse was trying to sniff out Harry's messy black hair, he noticed the horse's eyes for the first time. They looked intelligent, yes, but what stopped him from actually petting the horse was the fact that the mare's eyes were a stunning shade of emerald green.

When did horses start having green eyes that looked so much like his own? _Since I came here, I suppose,_ Harry heard Susannah's voice say from their first meeting after the Welcome Feast.

"Susannah?" Harry whispered, hardly daring to believe it.

The horse paused, then suddenly reared backwards, pawing the air with its forelegs and whinnying loudly. The sound soon merged into a woman's laugh as Susannah suddenly stood on two feet where the horse once was. Her dark hair was untied and blowing free in the breeze that rippled across the still surface of the lake, and her green eyes were filled with amusement as she looked down at Harry.

"You're even more perceptive than I thought," she said, still laughing as she offered Harry a hand up. "What was it that gave me away? Did I not act horse-like enough for you?"

"Y-your eyes, it was your eyes," Harry stammered, still trying to wrap his head around the revelation as he took Susannah's hand and pulled himself off the ground. "Hang on. You—you're an Animagus?! But…you're not registered, Hermione showed me the lists—"

"Ah, but which lists?" Susannah grinned and tossed her head, much as a wild filly would with its mane. "The American Association of Animagi keeps our lists separate from the International Confederation of Shapeshifters, you know, even though we're one of their largest chapters. And the United States doesn't have any age restrictions on learning the art, see." She hesitated, then leaned closer to Harry and continued in a softer voice. "The reason I was commander of the SSAA—well, not _just_ the SSAA, but I was also leader of a smaller brigade within it. The Animal Corps. It's thirteen of us together, all students, all Animagi. We've practiced fighting in human form, in animal form, and while morphing between the two."

Harry swallowed. A whole body of student Animagi, all trained and ready to fight…all under Susannah's leadership. It was an awe-inspiring thought, imagining the Death Eaters being surprised by the sudden transformations of their foes into a wide range of creatures that could _fight back._ And in that moment, he knew what he wanted to learn from Susannah, even more than Occlumency.

"Teach me. Please. Teach me to be an Animagus," Harry said, his voice quiet but determined. "I want to learn. My dad and my…godfather…they were both Animagi. Unregistered. I know they would have wanted to show me…" Harry trailed off, wondering if Sirius ever would have gotten around to teaching his godson how to be an Animagus. Probably, knowing Sirius…and he probably would have shown Harry the best ways to have fun in his animal form, whatever it might turn out to be. Harry could feel his eyes filling up just at the thought of what could have been.

Susannah watched Harry for a long moment, her green eyes unreadable. But as Harry stopped speaking, she immediately nodded and moved forward, pulling a surprised Harry into a quick hug. "Harry, of course, I'll teach you," she murmured before releasing him. "Of course. And since England seems to have more rules than America has states…I won't tell McGonagall, all right?" She flashed Harry a small grin. "Keep the spirit of your dad's law-breaking alive, right?"

Harry had to laugh at that, and Susannah giggled with him, the sounds of their laughter carrying across the lake and into the early morning skies, promising a time in the future when such carefree sounds would no longer be a rarity in the Wizarding World. And, Harry thought as he and Susannah began to trek back to the castle…with Susannah training him, maybe that future wasn't as far off as it seemed.


	5. Chapter V

**Disclaimer:**

A boy with cropped white-blonde hair strutted onstage, a disgusted sneer pasted on his face. He surveyed the audience with obvious contempt for some minutes.

"Come on, Draco!" hissed the author, Regina Noctis, from behind the curtains. She was eager for the disclaimer to be over with so that her story could continue. "Just say the lines, and it'll be over with, all right?"

Malfoy scowled and turned to leave; but when he attempted to walk offstage, a dog collar appeared around his neck, zapping him as he struck the Invisible Fence surrounding the stage. With the tips of his blonde hair singed black, he quickly retreated and complied.

"All Harry Potter characters belong to J,K. Rowling and to no other," he drawled while trying to regain his dignity. "The author of this fanfiction does not wish to infringe on these rights. She is only borrowing them for a short time. Also, any resemblance on my part to a certain Tom Felton is entirely coincidental. _My_ hair, at least, is purely natural."

A neon APPLAUSE sign flashed on over Malfoy's head. Malfoy smirked and bowed as the audience duly applauded—the volume increasing as Regina snuck quietly onstage behind Malfoy, _katana_ in hand, and sliced one of the many ropes tied to the wall behind them.

There was a whoosh of air, and Malfoy looked up just as a metal block labeled "16 TONS" crashed down on top of him.

Susannah, sitting in the middle row, had knocked over her popcorn and was laughing hysterically. "I…bloody…LOVE…Monty Python!" she gasped between giggles.

Harry, sitting next to her, looked askantly at his Defense professor and wondered if Monty Python understood Parseltongue.

* * *

The days quickly passed as the weather suddenly took a change for the chillier at Hogwarts. Students were seen bundling themselves up in winter cloaks and multicolored scarves as they hurried through the courtyards to classes, the ice-covered grass crackling under their feet. Hagrid was often seen outside in his garden as soon as the sun rose, his face barely visible under the pea-green muffler and bright orange scarf he bundled over his moleskin coat, frantically working to keep the frost off his precious pumpkins as they grew to superhuman size for the Halloween festivities.

Another common sight on the grounds in the mornings was the Boy Who Lived. Young girls would often line up around the edge of the Lake as he finished his morning work-out, squeeing and swooning dead away as Harry mopped his sweating face off with a towel. True, he had dispensed with the regular school robes and was only wearing a Muggle T-shirt and running shorts (more like running pants, seeing as they were hand-me-downs from his cousin Dudley). But what else could he do if he didn't want to overheat during exercise? It wasn't like he was trying to give his fangirls a good show—it only came as an extra bonus, apparently.

Every morning after his run around the Lake (and extra gymnastic sessions if no one were around to watch—Harry was too embarrassed to try anything aerobic if other students were gaping at him), Harry would grab a bite to eat from Great Hall before class. Invariably he'd meet up with Hermione, or Ron, or Ginny. They would exchange looks, then pass by each other without another word. If it was Hermione, or sometimes Ginny, there would be tears in her eyes, while Ron usually put on a scowl and turned his head away first. However, after Harry saw Ginny snogging Michael Corner at the Ravenclaw table, with both of them looking as if they hadn't slept a wink the night before, Harry did his best to avoid even glancing at Ginny throughout the entire breakfast, especially if her new boyfriend was with her.

What happened next depended on the day of the week. If it was a weekday, Harry and the rest of the Gryffindor and Slytherin seventh-years always had Defense Against the Dark Arts. True to her word, Susannah kept the class on their respective toes. Every other day was Defense practicals, where she would train them in both Magic and Muggle techniques for fighting off an enemy in close combat. Harry noticed that most of her techniques had Japanese names and origins—she had adapted the arts of the ancient Japanese _samurai _for magical users, showing her students how one could parry and attack with a sword in one hand while firing off spells with a wand in the other. By the time October came round, Susannah was promising to show the class how to throw ninja stars, something she demonstrated on Malfoy during one of his pre-class rants to his fellow Slytherin groupies. One moment, he'd been complaining to Pansy Parkinson of what his father would do "if he knew we were learning low-class Muggle methods"; the next, he was cursing up a non-magical blue streak while pulling a small silver blade out of his right hand. Harry hadn't been the only one sniggering; even Pansy looked rather disgusted by her boyfriend's crying for the Hospital Wing.

Even on the weekends, Harry often met up with Susannah in the morning, privately, for the Occlumency sessions McGonagall had scheduled for them—and for the secret Animagus tutoring Susannah had promised when they'd met by the Lake on that second morning of classes. As it happened, the two sessions were, for the first few weeks, one and the same.

"You see, Harry, becoming an Animagus isn't just about learning the spells." Susannah and Harry were, on Harry's suggestion, locked up in the Room of Requirement that first Saturday. The Room had transformed into a meditation room at Susannah's request, one lined with Japanese straw _tatami_ mats like the ones they used during Defense practice. "Being an Animagus requires you to look deep inside yourself, to search your very soul to find the animal that best represents you as a whole. And that, I've found, is a goal best reached using the ancient method of Zazen meditation, which was what I was going to use to start your Occlumency lessons in any case."

"Zazen? It sounds Japanese." Harry gestured to the _tatami_ mats, and to the _katana_ and _wakizashi_ swords that Susannah had left belted to her slender waist after her morning exercise (she, too, did work-outs in the morning at the same time Harry did, though hers was of a decidedly different nature). "You seem to use a lot of Japanese stuff when you're teaching us."

"That happens to be my area of interest. I grew up in a Japanese-American household, and their magical society in ancient times was perhaps one of the best in blending with their Muggle counterparts." Susannah dropped to her knees, sat down and crossed her legs, closing her eyes and taking a few deep breaths as she did so. Harry followed suit, but he wasn't quite sure what she was doing. It seemed to be a meditation of some sort.

"Zazen, you asked." Susannah broke the silence after a few moments, still keeping her eyes closed. "A form of Buddhist meditation in Japan, embraced by _samurai _and other nobles and by them alone. Perhaps the easiest instruction from me would be, to let go of everything, then to let go of letting go, and to let go of letting go of letting go, and so on."

Harry blinked. "Does that even make sense?"

Susannah laughed at Harry's obvious confusion. "Yes, it will, eventually. Just sit like I do, and practice taking deep breaths and thinking about nothing. Imagine a plain white wall in front of your eyes at all times during this meditation. And let whatever thoughts that float up from your subconscious drift across your mind like clouds on a summer day. Give it a shot."

"Do all Japanese talk in metaphors?" Harry muttered to no one in particular, but crossed his legs and resigned himself to the meditation. It turned out to be much harder than Susannah made it look. It took him all the way to October to manage to get a blank white wall in his mind continuously; and by the time Halloween rolled around, Harry still hadn't figured out what his Animagus form would look like, and he still couldn't resist Susannah's gentle mental prods that she used to test his Occlumency shields. She wasn't as harsh or vindictive as her father, surely—when she managed to penetrate into his mind, Susannah always quickly pulled back before she could see anything of great importance; but Harry was still slightly annoyed that he allowed a Snape of any gender or generation into his mind.

* * *

In the afternoons on school days, Harry least looked forward to Snape's Advanced Potions class, where the man would go to any lengths to give the Gryffindors the worst times of their lives. It wasn't until the third week of classes that Harry found the courage to go to the Room of Requirement and retrieve the Half-Blood Prince's Potions textbook; and even then he wasn't about to use it directly under Snape's overlarge, hooked nose. So he had to rely on what he could remember reading from the night before, which was admittedly not much. If Hermione were there to help him, it might have been different, but she and Ron were still not on speaking terms with Harry. Still, any little bit helped, and Harry's performance in Potions marginally improved, much to Snape's contempt. That didn't stop the Potions professor from taking away twice the number of points from Gryffindor as he gave to Slytherin due to "Potter's extreme incompetence."

Harry's favorite afternoon class was a tie between Hagrid's Care of Magical Creatures and Tonks' Transfiguration. As the new Head of Gryffindor House, Hagrid made up for whatever anti-Lion bias Snape had tortured them with earlier in the day, and his hut was always open to interested students of all Houses for an after-class discussion session of the day's lesson, complete with tea and rock-cakes that Harry knew better than to accept. When Harry came to one of the meetings, curious since Hagrid had never done anything like this before, he was surprised to discover that it had been Susannah who had suggested to the half-giant the novel idea. Of course, knowing Susannah, Harry supposed he shouldn't have been terribly surprised after all.

Tonks, on the other hand, was an entirely different class of teacher. She was much less cheerful than Hagrid and her old, usual self, but not quite as stern at all times as McGonagall used to be. Still, being an Auror certainly did wonders for discipline, as Tonks managed to be just as demanding as Moody when classes were in session. When she taught, she often had her arm draped across her midsection, an unconscious gesture that showed how much she thought about her unborn child. The baby bump wasn't going to show for a while yet, but Harry had heard that Tonks went to visit Madam Pomfrey once a week, and that her pregnancy seemed to be coasting along right on schedule. Harry came to her office once or twice a week after classes now, usually to comfort the Metamorphagus during one of her part-pregnancy-induced, mostly-husband-abandonment-caused crying sessions.

Evenings were just as crazy as the rest of the day, no matter what day of the week it was. Every other evening, Harry saved some time for a quick letter to his new adoptive father, letting him know what was going on at Hogwarts and what Death-Eater-related information he could find from the gossip mill that was the student body. Moody was pleased to report, in a series of letters in mid-September, that Harry's information had led directly to the arrests of several prominent pureblood wizards and witches, all of whom were now revealed to be Voldemort supporters if not Death Eaters themselves. Harry could almost see Moody's enthusiasm in every ink-splattered word on the parchment as Moody tried to get the words out faster than his hands would let him.

The rest of the time Harry spent on Quidditch. Even with a war raging outside of Hogwarts' sturdy walls, with the Muggle and magical civilian death toll multiplying on every _Daily Prophet_ cover page, nothing could take away the joys Harry derived from flying. And now that he didn't have to work with the D.A. as Susannah was more than adequate in teaching Defense, his schedule allowed him to take on the duties of Gryffindor Quidditch Captain without overly stressing his daily workload. Even though he'd been banned for the last few months of the previous year, Harry showed no signs of having lost his skills as Seeker; the first game against Ravenclaw was an easy win, 250 to nil, also proving that Ron was in fact improving and developing into a masterful Keeper. Harry took no credit for that, as he barely spoke to the youngest two Weasleys during practices anymore, thanks to their ongoing feud over Susannah.

In fact, when Susannah stopped by the Gryffindor locker rooms on the Quidditch Pitch the Friday before Halloween, Harry only realized her presence by the angry snarl emanating from Ron's side of the locker room. When he looked up, still half-struggling into his school robes after the shower, Harry heard a soft gasp and just caught a flash of dark hair disappearing around the corner of the locker room's entrance. Bemused, Harry finished dressing and quickly made his way outside, thinking that perhaps Hermione had peeked in too early and caught sight of her boyfriend undressed—not that Harry assumed she hadn't seen Ron in a greater state of undress before.

Harry rounded the corner of the locker room, and stopped dead as he saw Susannah leaning against the wall, her face half-averted from the entry. What he could see of her face was redder than Ginny's hair.

"Um, hello, Harry," Susannah mumbled, looking more like an embarrassed fifth-year than a Hogwarts professor. "Sorry, I didn't realize you weren't—quite finished yet…"

Harry lost control of the snigger he was biting on, and the dirty look Susannah shot at him made him laugh outright. "No, it's fine, really…I'm actually surprised you hadn't planned that on purpose. Most girls get a peek at us sometime before they graduate," he offered, quite unhelpfully, as he came closer.

Susannah rolled her eyes. "I did _not_ need to know about _that_ Hogwarts tradition," she muttered, then shook herself and pulled out a scrap of parchment from her pocket. Harry took it from her, curious at first, then feeling a chill run up his spine as he read the few words on the parchment. Raising his head, he stared at Susannah, using what little he knew of Legilimency from her coaching to scan the surface of her mind. Sure enough, she'd let her shields down for him to see what he needed to see.

"It's true, then? You've found it?" he asked Susannah, not daring to speak above a whisper.

"McGonagall did, and just this one, at least." Susannah glanced around to make sure no one else was around before continuing in a softer tone. "We'll need to go after it tomorrow. Meet me in my office at eight in the morning." Susannah paused. "And since you know the way best…I hope you'll have figured out by then how to get us back once we're through?"

Harry nodded, his eyes now fixed on the parchment again, making sure that he wasn't hallucinating. Of all the places that he'd imagined one of the horcruxes to be, it was perhaps the most obvious. And yet he'd never even thought of checking there first.

_The first one lies in the Chamber of Secrets._

* * *

Harry was pacing outside Susannah's quarters by five minutes to eight the next morning; just as the clock struck the hour in the Great Hall, Harry knocked on the door and slipped inside when she told him to enter. He had his Firebolt shrunken and tucked into one pocket and his wand in the other pocket of his baggy jeans, which had been a hand-me-down from Dudley, as had been the white T-shirt he was also wearing. It was tatty on the sleeves (which nearly reached his elbows), but it was more than suitable for the muck they might encounter on their way through the Chamber's entrance.

Susannah was still in the room adjoining her office where, Harry assumed, she slept and otherwise lived when she wasn't working. And it wasn't long after he wandered over to her bookcases, tilting his head to the right to read some of the titles on Occlumency, that she stepped out and closed the bedroom door quietly behind her. She, too, was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt; and glinting around her neck was a golden chain that Harry had never seen her wear before. The chain was for an oval-shaped locket, just the right size for a miniature portrait, made out of gold and resting just over her cleavage on top of the shirt she wore.

"Are you interested in what's inside or outside of my shirt, Harry?" Susannah asked with a trace of amusement when Harry's eyes rested a moment too long at the level of her bosom. Harry flushed, realizing as his professor laughed that she was getting her revenge for the day before.

"Nice locket," he mumbled, fighting to keep his blushing under control. "I've never seen it before…"

"I always wear it, but under my robes, so I hope you've never seen it before!" Susannah laughed, working on pulling her hair out of the way into a tight ponytail while she talked. "It was my mother's. She died shortly after I was born, and Father gave this to me when I started school at Salem. It's all I have of her, so I hate to take it off, you see…"

Harry felt his heart twist a little as Susannah sighed. "I'm sorry," he said quietly, not sure what else to say that would be appropriate. "At least you have something of your mother's, though," he added after a moment's thought. "I don't have much of either of my parents, really. Just my father's pocket-watch, but I only got that back a few months ago."

Susannah offered Harry a small smile. "Thanks, Harry. Here, would you like to see it?" She lifted the chain over her head and held it out for him, the golden chain pooling out and dangling down from her fingers. Harry took the locket, surprised at its weight in his hand, and turned it over in his palm, examining it carefully. The front of the locket had an engraving of a fleur-de-lis, not unlike his father's watch; and when Harry flipped open the locket's lid, he found a relatively-long inscription engraved around the inside in a delicate and tiny script.

_To my darling flower. I gave you my heart and everything in it long ago. May you keep it here, close to your own heart, and let our hearts never be twain. Forever yours, J._

"Who's J?" Harry mused, half to himself.

"I've always wondered that myself." Susannah moved behind Harry, peering over his shoulder at the inscription. "I've always supposed that the flower was my mother, but that doesn't explain the J. I honestly don't know—Father never talked about my mother much. I don't even know her full name." Harry jerked his head around in surprise at that. "Yeah, I know, it's weird, isn't it? But Father was really torn up when she died. Can't even stand to talk about her. That was part of the reason I took the Hogwarts job, actually. I know she was a witch and studied here, so I was hoping I could find out who my mother was."

"Any luck so far?" Harry asked, curious now.

Susannah shrugged, quite prettily. "No. Classes are taking far more time than I'd originally thought." Nimbly, she snagged the locket out of Harry's open hand and dropped it over her own head. "Ready to go?" she asked with a playful wink as she opened the door and held it for Harry to go first. Harry willingly went out, turning around as Susannah closed the door, her locket swinging around her neck like a pendulum.

They walked together up to Myrtle's third-floor bathroom, mostly in silence, with Harry considering what Susannah had said about her late mother, and Susannah thinking about goodness-knew-what. Both of their thoughts were interrupted by a shrill wailing, emanating from the girl's bathroom at the end of the corridor. Susannah's hand immediately came up, wand in place.

"Don't worry, that's just Myrtle," Harry assured her, stepping ahead and pushing open the bathroom door. Susannah slowly followed him in, glancing around until her eyes fell on the source of the sound: a stall at the very end, where otherworldly moaning and sobbing noises echoed weirdly in the tiled room. "She's a Hogwarts student who died here. She haunts that toilet, which is why not many come here."

"Harry? Is that you?" Myrtle abruptly stopped her crying and floated through the closed bathroom door. Susannah gasped and fell back at the sight, her hand on her chest, eyes wide. Harry just sighed.

"Yeah, Myrtle. It's me. How're things going here?" he asked as nonchalantly as one could with a silvery ghost floating just in front of his face. "You all right?" he asked Susannah out of the side of his mouth. From his peripheral vision he could see her nod, her eyes fixed on Myrtle.

"Yeah, just—not used to seeing ghosts quite up close and personal like this," she said shakily. "In the States they're rarely corporeal…"

Harry realized that Susannah had never really seemed comfortable around the Hogwarts House Ghosts at the same moment that Myrtle suddenly sniffed, her eyes squinching up behind her pearly lenses. "Oh, it's always the same," she sobbed, tears tracking down her translucent face. "Always talking about me like I'm not there, always talking about ghosts this and uncomfortable that…" Myrtle whirled on a stunned Susannah. "Hasn't it ever occurred to you that some ghosts have _feelings?!_" Myrtle shrieked at the American.

Susannah winced, which seemed to be answer enough for Myrtle. The ghost let out a loud wail, then turned and swooped back into her stall. The sound of a loud splash let Harry know that she was safe in her toilet again, her muffled cries echoing weirdly against the pipes.

"Erm. Sorry?" Susannah offered a half-minute too late. Harry just chuckled and shook his head, moving over to the sinks to find the pipe with the snake engraved on it. When he hissed at the snake to open, he could hear Susannah whirl around and cry out in surprise as the yawning hole grew in size.

"Ladies first," Harry motioned with a small bow. Susannah rolled her eyes and clambered in, a bit hesitant at first until Harry assured her that it was just a slide. Harry waited until he heard her shrieks of surprise fade away into the distance before plunging in himself.

"YAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Harry landed on his feet at the bottom, where Susannah was waiting for him, her arms crossed in the eternal pose of annoyance. "Thanks for not warning me," she muttered with a half-serious glare. "I have to say, I've never been overly fond of Muggle roller coasters…"

Harry shrugged. "Me neither. But it's like flying, in a way, so I don't mind it too much."

"I actually don't like flying, either—"

"WHAT?!"

"—except to watch Quidditch, that is. It's what happens when your foster siblings are nuts for the game. Good job on that last match of yours, by the way, you really are as good as they say you are."

Harry could feel his cheeks heat up a little. He'd often been praised on his flying talent before, but hearing it from Susannah was something special indeed.

"Well." Susannah cleared her throat, effectively breaking the spell and drawing attention back to the task at hand. "Here we are. Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets."

"Yeah." Harry gestured past the pile of rocks that constituted the cave-in from Lockhart's failed _Obliviate._ "There's a hole we can climb through back there, and then we'll be in the Chamber proper. Sorry for the mess, it's what Ron and I left after we were here last time…"

"Ron? Ron Weasley?" Susannah carefully stepped around some smaller heaps of rocks and debris as the two of them made their way over to the wall of fallen stone. "Gryffindor, seventh-year, redhead as they come? Doesn't he have a younger sister in sixth year, too?"

"That's right." Harry felt a pang of emotion when he thought of his erstwhile best friend, with whom he was no longer on speaking terms anymore; but that thought was quickly brushed away when Harry found that the hole in the wall that Ron had created was now so small from shifting rocks that there was no chance he could squeeze through. Or had he just grown that much? "Ginny was the one taken into the Chamber five years ago, so Ron and I came to rescue her. _Reducto!_"

Several blasts later, and with with Susannah's help, Harry had sent most of the rock into oblivion, leaving their way dusty but clear once more. "Haven't been here since then, actually," Harry mused thoughtfully as they continued to walk towards the darkened chamber, torches magically flaring to life as they passed through the corridor. "I wonder if the body of that basilisk is still here…"

Susannah stopped dead in her tracks. "A basilisk? Whoa, wait, hold on right there." She stared at Harry. "You fought a basilisk when you were twelve. And you KILLED it?!"

"Um…yes?" Harry shrugged again. "I mean, it was mostly luck. If Fawkes—that's Dumbledore's old phoenix—hadn't given me the Sorting Hat, I wouldn't have had the Sword of Gryffindor, and I guess I wouldn't have survived long enough to be talking to you right now…"

He trailed off at the look of disbelief in Susannah's eyes. "I see you've been giving Lady Luck a run for her money," Susannah deadpanned.

Harry continued walking, and Susannah joined him a moment later. "Apparently." A few moments of silence later, he added in a deceptively serious tone, "But maybe my being able to speak Parseltongue is an added bonus?"

Susannah snorted, and Harry didn't need to turn around to see the half-amused, half-annoyed look in her eyes. "You really aren't what most would call normal, are you, Mr. Potter?" Susannah asked dryly.

Harry laughed, and when he sensed the dark corridor ahead open up into a vast space, he called out in Parseltongue, "_Lights!_"

Susannah screamed as the flaring torchlight revealed the almost-perfect corpse of the huge basilisk in front of them. The only defects with the creature were its empty eye sockets and the fact that it was dead. With the normal humidity of Scotland taken into account, Harry was frankly surprised that the basilisk's body was in such pristine condition, and he said as much aloud.

"It's because…of the venom," Susannah said faintly from behind the hand that was pressed over her mouth. "Basilisk venom kills almost instantly, but it's also an excellent preservative, since the basilisk often feeds much later than it kills…" She shook herself all over for a moment, then let her hand fall from her mouth, revealing the greenish tint in her face. "Father would have an orgasm over this." Harry winced at the image. "Sorry, but it's true. Do you know how much he has to pay for basilisk skin and fangs for his potions? It's practically murder."

Harry frowned. As much as he disliked Snape, he _was_ Susannah's father, after all. "If you want it, you can have some. Merlin knows I won't be using it anytime soon." Harry waved to the high walls of the Chamber surrounding them. "But let's get our job done first, shall we?"

"Right, right. Horcrux to find and all that jazz." Susannah immediately started jogging to the walls on Harry's left, around the basilisk's body…and promptly tripped. "OW! Stupid thing, I think it's attached to the flo—oh!"

And to Harry's shock, Susannah disappeared from view with a sharp cry as she reached out to touch the outcropping on the floor that had sent her sprawling.

"Susannah?" No answer. "Susannah!" Harry sprinted over, worry gnawing at him from inside. Where Susannah had fallen, only an imprint of where her body had lain in the dust remained. That, and an emerald green stone jutting out of the floor near where her feet had been…

On an impulse, Harry bent over and grabbed the stone—and with an unfamiliar tugging of magic on his skin, he found himself falling forward into darkness, landing after a few moments on top of something soft.

"Oof!"

"Susannah! Sorry, couldn't help it—"

"I know you couldn't, just get _off_!"

"I'm trying! Hang on, my pants are stuck on something…I think it's your foot…"

One unhelpful shove later, Harry managed to get untangled from Susannah's long legs and roll off onto the cold stone floor. Panting, he pulled out his wand (which was fortunately not broken) and gasped, "_Lumos!_"

Susannah matched him, and their twin lights illuminated the once-secret room they now lay in. Harry heard Susannah's sharp intake of breath; as for him, he could barely find the air to breathe deeply enough.

There, on a pedestal made out of black marble that glowed black under the light of their wands, rested a small, double-handled, golden chalice with an engraving of a badger glinting on the front. Without question, it was the very same cup that Tom Riddle had covetously gazed at in the hands of Hepzibah Smith.

"The cup of Helga Hufflepuff." Susannah's tone was awestruck, even though her voice barely carried above a whisper. "Dammit, Harry. I thought it was lost years ago!"

"It was only lost because Voldemort stole it shortly after graduation." Harry pushed himself off the ground and slowly moved towards the cup. Even from a distance, he could feel the Dark Magic pulsing around the chalice. "And he used it to make one of his first horcruxes," Harry said softly, almost not hearing himself say the words. For the cup was singing to him, softly coaxing him one step closer, then another, until his fingers were just about to wrap themselves around the delicate handles…

"Harry, NO!" Susannah was suddenly next to him, forcing his arm down and partly breaking the horcrux' enchantment. Harry felt a surge of irritation, and he could almost hear the cup hissing in anger. But no, it really was hissing. _Foolish boy! Don't let her stop you! _He could vaguely understand the archaic, accented Parseltongue that it spoke. _Take what is rightfully yours! Power, money, anything you desire, shall be yours! Even the girl, you know which one, I can make her yours—_

"Harry, snap out of it!" Harry suddenly found himself grabbed roughly by the shoulders and shaken. The hazy mist surrounding his mind suddenly cleared, and he found himself staring into the angry green eyes of Susannah. When she was sure that he was himself again, she released his shoulders quickly.

"Harry, the Dark Magic on that thing is huge," she said quietly. "Don't touch it, or even get close to it. It looked like—you were listening to it, almost…"

Harry shuddered. If it hadn't been for Susannah's intervention, he could have ended up like Dumbledore's hand, or worse. "Yeah, thanks for that." Harry rubbed his arm ruefully. "It was like an _Imperio,_ but worse. I never knew Parseltongue could sound that convincing."

Susannah shot him an odd look before turning to face the cup. "I'm not even going to ask how you know what an _Imperius_ feels like," she muttered, then raised her wand. Harry heard the warning hiss of the cup just before she spoke the spell. "_Contineo _Horcrux!"

A stream of blinding blue light streamed out from the tip of her wand, surrounding the cup (which protested shrilly to Harry's ears) in a glowing, electric blue ball of magical energy. Once the cup was no longer visible, Susannah cancelled the light, leaving the glowing cage behind. Harry found that the horcrux' voice was greatly muffled by the spell, much to his relief.

"That's loads better, thanks." Before Susannah could stop him, Harry easily Levitated the horcrux off the pedestal and towards them. "I can't hear it anymore," he explained to her confused look.

Susannah immediately looked relieved at that. "Now that we have that—thing contained…" She glanced up, perturbed by the solid stone walls surrounding them. "How do we get out of here—oh, _shit._"

Harry ignored Susannah's out-of-character, non-magical curse in favor of swearing rather loudly himself, because just at that moment the walls of the small chamber started to grind slowly together, closing in on them on all sides.

It looked like Voldemort had one little booby-trap left behind…and Harry had no idea how to get out of it this time.


End file.
